Those old paperbacks were of mixed quality, but they offered an opportunity I didn’t appreciate immediately: The chance to travel back in time a bit. Digging into those old books offered a break from the bestseller lists and the constant focus on what was new, to experience examples of writing from other time periods—they were lessons about what life was like decades or even centuries ago. 

The first time I was conscious of learning something about everyday life from an old book involved Dorothy L. Sayers’ classic mystery Whose Body?, featuring her aristocratic detective Lord Peter Wimsey.³ Published in 1923, the story could be updated to the modern day pretty easily, except for one detail: The way everyone treats telephones. Phones weren’t brand-new in 1923, but newspapers were still publishing articles chronicling the astonishing growth of phone networks, and phone calls were expensive and complex, especially long-distance calls. In the novel, not only does Lord Wimsey keep his phone in a special room, but making a long-distance “trunk-call” is a notable activity, and one that involves politely asking someone to make the connection and ring you back when they have your party on the line.⁴ 

This one detail, capturing the way people viewed telephones (as a new and expensive technology), reminded me that the book had been written in a reality that no longer existed, and reflected a set of attitudes and social behaviors that no longer made much sense. And that’s when I realized that if you want to know what life was like at any specific point in the past, one of the most effective (and interesting) ways to research it is to dig into the pop culture of the era.⁵ 

The Other Way to Research 

When we think of research in terms of writing fiction, we usually default to the usual stuff: Hours spent squinting at a computer screen as we pick our way through Google searches or sifting through reference works at the local library,⁶ falling down rabbit holes of information. Some more ambitious folks might arrange to travel places so they can get a firsthand understanding of the geography, topography, and culture of a specific area, or to see locations with historic interest in real life.⁷ 

While that kind of research can give you a strong factual and physical basis for a historical or history-inspired setting, what it can’t give you is the vibe. History has a way of flattening cultural attitudes and lifestyles into simplified versions, leaving the more complex and nuanced understanding to scholars who have the time to dig through original sources. Consider the American Revolution, which is usually presented in hyper-patriotic terms as if every single resident of the original Thirteen Colonies was an ecstatic supporter—when the truth is much, much more complicated.⁸ 

That’s where old novels, plays, movies, and TV shows come in. These are works of fiction, yes, but when fiction is set in the writer’s current moment, they often reflect—very, very accurately—many of the unseen attitudes, traditions, and perspectives that get hidden by the necessary simplification of even high-quality history.⁹ Both well-known classics and lesser-known works can give you a clear sense of what life was really like at the time—how people dressed, spoke, and lived. 

The key here is that most of this stuff wasn’t consciously included by those creators—when you read a book published last year and set in the modern day, you don’t even notice details like what people are wearing, or the apps they use on their phone, because we’re immersed in these details ourselves every day—they’re invisible. But in 200 years, those details will likely leap out at future readers in the same way someone looking up phone numbers in the Whitepages does to us.¹⁰ 

If you want to get a ground-level sense of how people actually lived and thought back in The Day, supplementing your research with some old-timey pop culture is a smart move—those musty old books and movies can offer a wide range of information you won’t find cataloged in more formal sources. Here are a few benefits of digging into our pop culture past. 

Contemporaneous Attitudes 

Times change. Attitudes change, and the Overton window of acceptable behavior constantly shifts.¹¹ History books are usually too high-level to dig into the details of common attitudes that might have been top-of-mind for people living in that moment, and even well-researched historical fiction will commonly overlook problematic behaviors and beliefs if they don’t serve the story’s themes. But pop culture created in that moment—or reasonably close to it—can offer a glimpse of what those attitudes were, because they were common at the time. 

If you want to know how people viewed everyday life in the Middle Ages, The Canterbury Tales is a treasure trove of information about how people viewed a wide range of subjects, from society itself (comically corrupt) to gender roles (surprisingly messy).¹² If you’re looking for an accurate depiction of early 19^th-century attitudes toward sexuality, read The Scarlet Letter, itself based on the sensational murder of Sarah Maria Cornell in 1832, just 18 years before, as well as what may be the first work of what we’d recognize as true crime, Fall River: An Authentic Narrative by Catharine R. Williams, written just a year later and digging into Cornell’s sad story as satisfyingly as any modern podcast. If you wonder how the public broadly viewed life during the Great Depression, the film It Happened One Night is a frothy screwball comedy that offers several insightful glimpses of how people survived one of the worst financial crises of modern times.¹³ 

The Little Details 

History books often give you little information about how people actually behaved—how they spoke informally (as opposed to speeches or interviews) and the little details that occupied their thoughts. But contemporary books and other media can offer a glimpse. 

The Catcher in the Rye is not just a terrific book, it’s also a strikingly accurate time capsule of how teenagers spoke and interacted in early 1950s America. While Holden Caulfield is a singular character with unique privilege, obsessions, and goals, the way he communicates with people throughout the story gives you a sense of what people were talking about and how they talked about it. Do the Right Thing isn’t just a terrific film, it’s also a film that captures a specific moment in American urban life—as well as its speech patterns and dress codes—that would be invaluable for anyone writing a story about that time and place. 

Local Knowledge 

Something else The Catcher in the Rye offers as a research resource is a sense of place. If you pay attention as you read, you get a pretty clear idea of what New York City in the 1950s was like—Holden travels around quite a bit, and you could construct a workable map of the city from the details he drops along the way.¹⁴ As challenging as James Joyce’s Ulysses is to read, it’s also an incredibly accurate rendering of Dublin in the early 20^th century that you could mine for any story set there. 

It’s not just famous old novels that can offer this kind of historical detail. The 1948 film Act of Violence isn’t exactly top of mind for people these days, but it was shot on location in a Los Angeles that literally doesn’t exist anymore, including a terrific chase sequence through the old Bunker Hill neighborhood that was completely redeveloped in the late 1980s. Films and TV shows filmed on location can be goldmines of information about places that simply no longer exist. 

The Invisibles 

Something that pop culture—especially novels—captures that more formal history usually misses are the unspoken, invisible attitudes of people at that time. When I read The Grapes of Wrath or watch the film adaptation, it’s extremely informative about the way people lived and survived during the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl era.¹⁵ But when I first read the book, I was struck by the complete lack of self-pity among the characters. There’s anger, exhaustion, and fear, yes, but everyone regards the economic catastrophe that has driven them from their homes in a desperate search for survival as something that’s happening to everyone—the entire country—not as a particular tragedy happening just to them. It’s a subtle thing, but it’s instructive—in large part because the story deals with events that were still happening when it was being written. 

There is one caveat to keep in mind if you use pop culture to better understand a past era: Be cognizant of the limitations of the creators. We all have weak areas, and writers, like everyone else, are a product of their times.¹⁶ A book, film, or other piece of pop culture might be very useful for one aspect of your research (geography, or attitudes toward a new technology) but not useful at all—possibly even deceptive—in other ways. It pays to do a little meta-research into the creators you’re relying on. 

Old-school pop culture is often a snapshot of a past time, filled with real, accurate information that can be difficult to pin down in other ways. If your current work-in-progress requires a little research into the past, set up a movie night, find out what everyone was reading that year, and settle in for some eye-opening entertainment.

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1. Define Your Mystery

Before diving into research, clearly define the core elements of your mystery. Consider the central crime or enigma beyond the traditional murder that will drive your narrative. Is it a theft, a disappearance, or perhaps a historical puzzle? Identifying this element will shape the direction of your research. Next, determine who the key players are. Who is your protagonist, and what is their role in unraveling the mystery? Who are the suspects, and what are their potential motives? Understanding these elements will ensure you gather relevant information that enhances your story. This clarity will also help you focus on the details needed to create a compelling and cohesive plot.

2. Immerse Yourself in the Setting

The setting of your mystery novel is crucial. It not only provides the backdrop for your story but also influences the plot and characters. Conduct thorough research on the location where your story unfolds. If it’s a real place, visit it if possible so you get the names (and local pronunciations for audio books) correct. Take notes on the location’s sights, sounds, and smells. If it’s fictional, draw inspiration from real locations to create a vivid and believable setting.

3. Understand the Crime

To write convincingly about crime, it’s essential to understand its intricacies. Start by researching different types of crimes, such as fraud, kidnapping, or cybercrime. Then explore the various motives behind them, like greed, revenge, or desperation. Delve into the psychological profiles of criminals to comprehend their behaviors and thought processes. This will also help you craft inspirational and three-dimensional foes and heroes alike. Analyzing case studies and true crime stories can provide valuable insights into how real-life mysteries are solved, revealing investigative techniques and the challenges faced by law enforcement. This knowledge will help you create a gripping plot, and allow you to craft scenarios that resonate with authenticity.

4. Master the Art of Investigation

Your protagonist, whether a professional detective, amateur sleuth, or journalist, must be adept at solving mysteries. To achieve this, research investigative techniques such as interviewing witnesses, gathering evidence, and analyzing crime scenes so your characters can demonstrate their bona fides. Furthermore, dig into forensic science to understand how DNA analysis, fingerprinting, and other scientific methods aid in solving crimes. Familiarize yourself with police procedures, including how cases are documented, the chain of command, and legal constraints. Understanding how investigations unfold in real life will lend legitimacy to your story, helping you craft believable scenarios that reflect the complexities and nuances of actual detective work, thereby enhancing the credibility of your narrative. Especially if you can help readers decipher the techno-jargon.

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5. Develop Complex Characters

Many terrific articles have been written about developing the characters who will populate your mystery novel. Suffice it to say, they drive the plot and engage readers. Consider researching different personality types, psychological disorders, and human behavior to create multi-dimensional characters. Consider their backgrounds, motivations, and relationships. The more complex and realistic your characters, both primary and secondary players, the more engaging your story will be.

6. Explore Legal and Ethical Issues

Mystery novels often chronicle legal and ethical dilemmas. Understand the legal system, courtroom procedures, and ethical considerations related to crime and justice. This knowledge will help you navigate complex plot points and add depth to your story. Call you local bar association if you have questions. They will be eager to help you get it right.

7. Use Technology to Your Advantage

In today’s digital age, technology plays a significant role in crime-solving. Research the latest advancements in such things as DNA sequencing and digital forensics. Explore modern surveillance techniques, including facial recognition and drone technology, to understand how they aid investigations. Probe into cybersecurity to learn about hacking, data breaches, and digital footprints, which are increasingly relevant in solving crimes. Incorporating these elements into your plot adds a modern twist, making your story more relevant to contemporary readers. And integration of technology also reflects the evolving landscape of crime-solving in the real world.

8. Interview Experts

One of the most effective ways to gather information is by interviewing subject-matter experts. And it’s loads of fun. Reach out to law enforcement officers, forensic scientists, psychologists, and legal professionals. Their insights can provide valuable details and lend validity to your narrative. Prepare thoughtful questions and be open to learning from their experiences. Be sure to ask if you can use or adapt their stories, and include them (if appropriate) in your acknowledgments.

9. Balance Fact and Fiction

While research is essential, remember that you are writing fiction. Use your research to inform and enhance your story, but don’t let it overwhelm the narrative. Strike a balance between factual accuracy and creative storytelling to maintain reader engagement. As you gather information, organize it systematically. Create a research database or use digital tools to categorize notes, articles, and interviews. This organization will make it easier to reference information as you write and ensure that no crucial detail is overlooked. Once your draft is complete, revisit your research. Ensure that all details align with the plot and characters. Be open to revising sections that may not fit seamlessly. Refining your story based on studious research will enhance its impact.

10. Stay Curious

Finally, cultivate a sense of personal curiosity. Mystery novelists thrive on asking questions and seeking answers. Stay curious about the world around you, and let that curiosity drive your research. The more you explore, the richer your stories will become.

Check out Wendy Gee’s Fleet Landing here:

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Ahh, research. Love it or hate it, a story can’t be built without it.  

Many writers struggle with forging an article out of piles of background research, interview notes, and attempted outlines. We all know it’s much better to have a mountain of research than next to nothing, but extracting the value buried in that mountain can feel as challenging as actually mining for precious metals.  

In the last year, I’ve found a reliable tool for shaping research into nonfiction stories. I believe it can work for all kinds of writing—nonfiction, fiction, poetry, even commercial copywriting, or technical communication. The practice of visual note-taking—also known as sketchnoting—has improved my ability to see patterns in my research and helped me define the structure for these stories, leading to the creation of better-written articles with less stress.  

One of the pioneers of visual note-taking is Mike Rohde, author of The Sketchnote Handbook and The Sketchnote Workbook. Like many writers, Rohde, whose primary occupation is user experience designer, struggled with taking notes at events and trying to make use of them later. He reached a breaking point in 2007 facing a design conference in Chicago.  

Shaking up his normal approach to note-taking, Rohde brought a small Moleskine notebook and a pen to the conference and gave up on the stenographic approach to capturing everything. He created titles and headings with hand-lettered type, and he added small hand-drawn pictures to his notes. The results amazed not only him but his audience on Flickr. 

“I was getting comments from people who were not at the event who said, ‘this is really helpful,’” Rohde said. “They would comment, ‘I got value from the notes you took because they were very concise and to the point’ … That’s when I stopped and said, wait a minute. There’s something interesting happening here.” 

Rohde is among a handful of experts to shape the practice of visual note-taking over the past dozen years. After discovering this fascinating approach to organizing ideas and concepts, I’ve realized its benefits when generating new article ideas, organizing research, and outlining stories.  

The Brain Science That Supercharges Sketchnotes 

Visual note-taking helps writers in a way that conventional notetaking can’t. The human brain is primed for visual stimuli; words, much as we writers love them, evolved to stand in for images, not the reverse.  

A team of researchers at MIT reported in 2014 that the brain can successfully process images it sees for as little as 13 milliseconds. By contrast, the brain takes between 130 and 150 milliseconds—10 times longer—to make sense of single words or simple three-word sentences.  

We also retain text that’s placed alongside visual information longer than words alone. Author and molecular biologist John Medina, in his 2008 book Brain Rules, cited a study finding participants who viewed (or listened) to text-based information remembered just 10 percent after three days. If they viewed the same information through a combination of text and images, they retained 65 percent three days later.    

Tom Wujec, a designer/technologist and the author of Pumping Ions and Five Star Mind, summarizes the advantages that sketchnotes bring to communication: “We are visual creatures. When you doodle an image that captures the essence of an idea, you not only remember it, but you also help other people understand and act on it.” 

Anatomy of a Sketchnote 

Each element of visual notetaking adds value to research and idea-generating tasks. Let’s take a look at what the elements are and how they amplify the value of the note.  

Icons and images are the most obvious additions to sketchnotes, and they help anchor the meaning of the text. These tiny visuals are rarely works of art; the level of expertise you’re aiming for is that you and your reader understand what the image/icon means.  

Lettering for banners, section headers, and body text helps convey to readers the importance of words used.  

Two powerful aspects of sketch notes are “containers” around related content and “connectors” (think arrows or roadways) to indicate navigation between chunks. Connectors direct the viewer’s eye from concept to concept. Creating this sense of direction defines the story path. 

Color can also be a powerful tool for emphasis. Carol Anne McGuire, who blogs about sketchnoting in educational settings, shares that color can be used to highlight a concept, add texture or shading to an image, or reinforce a connector’s path. Don’t overuse color—one or two colors, used sparingly, make important points pop out.  

While researching this article, I used an initial sketchnote in an A5 notebook to organize my research. Although I crowded a lot on the page, I discovered an effective visual metaphor—eyeglasses—around which to describe and illustrate significant parts of the story:

After refining the note a little and adding color and directional markers in a larger (A4, closer to a traditional 8.5 x 11 inch) notebook, there was a clear outline for the story. 

How to Get Started With Sketchnoting 

Sylvia Duckworth, Canadian educator and author of How to Sketchnote: A Step-by-Step Manual for Teachers and Students, encourages those new to sketchnoting with these three basic rules: 

1. Everyone can draw. 

2. You will improve with practice. 

3. It’s about the ideas, not the art.  

Rohde’s books help readers build images from just five basic shapes: square, circle, triangle, line, and dot. Other authors use different numbers of basic shapes but still boil everything down to a handful of elements.  

Beyond learning the ground rules and building blocks of visual note-taking, there are a couple of other important pointers.  

YOU determine what’s important. Visual note-taking summarizes an experience, interview, or idea. Leave the archival-level detail to recordings or transcripts. With sketchnotes, think like a curator, not a court reporter.  

Different parts of pre-writing work call for different types of sketchnotes. Sifting through research? Draw a note with a mind map or “popcorn” structure and look for patterns. Want to structure a story? Try a sketchnote with a path-like pattern taking the reader from beginning to end.  

You can also use sketchnotes to brainstorm. Here’s a sketchnote of mine summarizing ideas for career-related articles. It provided a great view of the ideas I wanted to develop into queries/pitches: 

Lean into the visual aspects of sketchnotes to maximize value. According to Rohde, what really sets visual note-taking apart is the ability to shift ideas and concepts around. Add images and icons liberally and place your concepts with intention on specific parts of your page. 

Practice, practice, practice. You don’t have to become a skilled artist to create great sketchnotes, but practice helps you add visual elements to your notes with less stress and more ease. 

Use visual note-taking outside of work. Look to hobbies and community activities for inspiration. Rohde hones his sketchnoting skills illustrating his pastor’s sermons and by creating game summaries for his beloved Green Bay Packers. Here’s his sketchnote for a 2023 game against the Kansas City Chiefs (my hometown team!): 

I’ll never be Picasso—or even Katherine May or Diane Ackerman—as a result of my sketchnoting, but learning how to use visual note-taking has given me a newfound confidence as a writer. Not only can I better visualize my stories, but I can see results in terms of queries accepted and articles published. That’s definitely a benefit well worth cultivating this skill!  

Top Visual Notetaking Books 

I’ve found these books helpful as I’ve developed my sketchnoting practice. 

• The Sketchnote Handbook by Mike Rohde 

• The Art of Visual Notetaking by Emily Mills 

• Visual Thinking: Empowering People and Organisations Through Visual Collaboration by Williemien Brand 

• The Doodle Revolution by Sunni Brown  

• Pencil Me In: The Business Drawing Book for People Who Can’t Draw by Christina Wodtke

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(The Personal Is Historical.)

When I conceived of the 19th protagonist of my historical novel Forged, I wanted to make her into the sort of vivid character readers expect to find in contemporary fiction. To achieve this, I had to get a grasp of all aspects of her life; the devil, as they say, is in the details.

My first inspiration for Forged came from a history podcast. I heard the story of a Gilded Age female con-artist who swindled banks out of untold millions, and I was surprised that I had never heard of Cassie Chadwick before. She grew up on a farm in Canada, which is where I’m from, and fashioned herself into a fake American heiress, with a mansion like a dragon’s lair, overflowing with jewels, gold, and works of art. She was like a 19th Century Anna Sorokin, but far more successful.

The historical details of Cassie’s life leading up to bank fraud are sketchy; what little I could find revealed a sordid string of petty cons, bilking money from people who could ill afford to lose it, and possibly trafficking vulnerable women. I was repulsed by what I read and had the strong sense that Chadwick was an impulsive psychopath with terrible executive function and hoarding disorder; she was not the sort of person I wanted taking up space in my brain for the length of time it takes me to produce a manuscript.

While real life criminals are not glamorous, her story did make me think of a glittering fictional character, Jay Gatsby. He too grew up on a farm, made his fortune illegally, and crafted a fake persona to fit into the beau monde. Thus, the Gilded Age con artist and Jay Gatsby underwent some sort of alchemy in my imagination, and Kitty Warren, the protagonist of Forged, emerged.

To get a sense of farming life in 19th Century Canada, I relied heavily on Susanna Moodie’s memoir, Roughing it in the Bush. Moodie was a middle-class English writer who emigrated with her husband and child to Canada in 1832; they settled in the backwoods of Ontario. She didn’t enjoy the pioneering life, and when her editor encouraged her to write an “emigrant’s guide,” Moodie recounted the difficulties, including food shortages, illness, blackflies and boorish, annoying neighbors, all with jaunty verve. I also re-read Margaret Atwood’s Alias Grace, which was inspired by Moodie’s writing, but that was mostly for fun.

Edith Wharton’s The Age of Innocence was a great resource for details about New York in the Gilded Age. Wharton wrote the novel after WWI, trying to recapture the aristocratic New York of her childhood, and so it is rich with visual details, particularly of interior design. Her somewhat jaundiced post-war gaze also notes questionable aspects of 19th Century social norms and mores, so readers get both the accuracy of first-hand observation and the analysis of an older writer living in a changed world.

Before New York, Kitty lived in two cities critical to building Gilded Age wealth: Pittsburgh, PA, and Cleveland, OH. Imagining Pittsburgh in its industrial heyday was easier than imagining Cleveland, in part because I used to live in Pittsburgh, but also because many of its neighborhoods and mansions are still standing. The Cleveland Public Library has scanned city maps from the Gilded Age available on its website; I printed these out and assembled them like a giant jigsaw puzzle on my kitchen floor to trace my protagonist’s movements in that city. I pored over old photos of Millionaire’s Row and descriptions of the mansions. I also read Cleveland in the Gilded Age, by Dan Ruminski and Alan Dutka.

While Kitty Warren wasn’t a clone of Cassie Chadwick, I did borrow liberally from details of Chadwick’s life. Like my antihero, Chadwick was a prolific forger, had a sister in Cleveland, snuck into Andrew Carnegie’s mansion, and ended up in jail (more than once, unsurprisingly). The prologue of my novel, in which a customs agent attempts to arrest Kitty for jewel smuggling, is based on a real account of Chadwick’s smuggling, published by a treasury agent in 1908. I’m not sure that T.S. Eliot was right about good authors borrowing, but this lazy author likes to borrow because it’s an easy way to get accurate granular historical details.

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A writing teacher once complained to me that her students’ characters are like cameras with feet. Visual detail is of course critical for communicating what a character is experiencing, but other senses matter too, smell in particular. The olfactory nerve is wired directly to the limbic system in the brain, which controls emotion, so smell and emotion are closely linked. When Kitty is feeling threatened, afraid, or in love, she is aware of the smells around her, and there are websites to answer almost every question about what those scents would be in the late 19th Century. Did you know that there were mountains of horse manure in vacant lots in New York? I didn’t either. I learned how garbage was handled (not well), that men wore Florida Water, and that most people bathed about once a week. The past was smelly.

Forged is a loose Great Gatsby retelling; the first two thirds take place before the start of Fitzgerald’s novel, and the last third maps onto some of the events in the book. Gatsby is a character with some unattractive traits, but it is his romantic ideals and doomed love for Daisy that define him in the popular imagination. Taking this fairy dust from a beloved text and sprinkling it on my protagonist, Kitty, whose scheming is much more central to her story than Jay Gatsby’s, confers her with borrowed respectability and maybe even admirability. Allusions to a famous work of fiction is a sort of cheat code for building a complex character. If it causes some rethinking about said famous work, that’s fun too.

I said at the outset that my goal was to make Kitty the sort of vivid character readers expect to find in contemporary novels and also that the real life woman who inspired me was too awful for me to want to write about. These two statements may seem contradictory, but I don’t believe that a distinctive, believable character in fiction has to be given every aspect of a real human. I think it’s okay to leave out some of the boring and bad bits; Kitty would have a lot to talk about in therapy, but that can stay in the background so we can enjoy her exploits. She is still a pretty interesting lady, and I hope you’ll get to meet her one day.

Check out Danielle Teller’s Forged here:

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(6 Things I Learned From Un-Trunking My Novels and Getting Them Published.)

The tragedy was all over the news and the newspapers. Her family, of course, was traumatized, but I discovered that there was another person who was heartbroken. A policeman, who had been on the scene, began parking his squad car at the crosswalk most weekdays. Here, he used a small video camera to film and ticket stop sign runners. I learned from an article that he pressed stickers with the child’s face onto these tickets. It seemed that he did not want drivers to forget how easily a life can be taken. How quickly one could lose a loved one.

 I often walked past him. He was intent, and I wondered what he was thinking, what drove him to show up and film even on the coldest days. Did he deter stop sign runners? Did he educate drivers?  Was he married? Did he have someone to talk to about what was clearly a devastating experience for him?

The image of this man standing on a corner day after day stayed with me for years. I wrote stories, got an MFA, and he lingered. Eventually, he became the seed for my novel, Intersections. As I had never known a police officer or written from a male point of view, some research was needed.

I first talked with a male officer who told me that out of all the things he faced, the death of a child was something he could not get over. Most officers, he’d said, find them unbearable. They carry these deaths with them. I spent time with a female officer who echoed his sentiments. Both officers were parents and gave me a window into the sorrows officers face all too often.

The female officer was invaluable in helping me with the facts. I learned that in Chicago, police precincts were called districts. She described her days, what the inside of a squad car looked like, and how close police partners grow. I could not have been accurate without her. Both officers were kind as well as patient with my rookie questions.

The life and feelings of the officer I observed would remain a mystery to me. I never spoke to him and have sometimes wondered if it would have been better if I had. But then he would have been too real. I would have been writing about a person’s life, and I might have been bound to facts. So, in the end, it was better that we were strangers. It gave me the freedom to imagine.

In Intersections, Ed became obsessed with finding the driver. In reality, the driver was quickly identified and imprisoned, but that truth would not have worked for my story. Another character, Charlotte, also witnessed the accident.  She thought she saw her own car fleeing the scene. The only person who could have been driving was her daughter who struggled with OCD and addiction. Although Ed and Charlotte become unlikely friends and confidantes, she kept this a secret. Later, an emotionally wounded Ed would view this as a betrayal.

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Slowly, Ed revealed himself to me, and I built his life while asking myself a lot of questions about how he felt and what was important to him. Because I began to write the novel 15 years after the incident, I also had the space and time to create Ed in ways I might not have if I’d written the novel right away. It allowed me to not consider or be bound by the truth of what actually happened.

Ed was facing challenges and losses. He was lonely, mourning the death of his best friend and partner who was killed in a drug bust in which Ed was also injured. Forensics found that the bullet came from his gun, and he was placed on paid leave pending an investigation. He was scared. Against Ed’s wishes, his wife became a surrogate for their daughter who has infertility issues and desperately wanted a baby. Ed worried endlessly about losing his wife to an age-related pregnancy stroke.

Prior to Intersections, I had written quite a few short stories but never had to sustain a deep dive into characters.  I discovered that I loved thinking about Ed and Charlotte and what they wanted. Or what they didn’t know they wanted but needed. Despite their flaws and their stumbles, they became important and real to me, and I hold them close.

Check out Karen F. Uhlmann’s Intersections here:

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(Writing Science Into Fiction.)

I worked as a journalist for some time in the 1990s, covering arts and entertainment, community news, and crime. I had grown up in a household in which two newspapers were delivered to our doorstep every morning. The news was on the television all day long in my home, from the morning, in which we watched the local news that would provide us with the update on weather and local traffic, to the mid-day news, evening news, and then we’d watch Ted Koppel on Nightline for in-depth segments. 

Current affairs were always a point of discussion at home, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Challenger disaster, the emergence of AIDS, the Cold War, Gulf War, the rise of the internet, and more. I clearly remember coverage during the Satanic Panic, interviews with John Wayne Gacy, the capture of Jeffrey Dahmer and the subsequent court trials. I also remember a number of high-profile organized crime cases. This was Chicago after all, and many crime families had a stronghold throughout the Chicagoland area and many of its suburbs.

This is all important because my educational background, my upbringing, and the information I was exposed to inform my interests and my approach to how I consume and discern information that is being given, or details I am seeking. It’s also important to note the nature of how the news is reported and consumed today is vastly different than what I was first exposed to over 40 years ago.

Exploration and inquiry are basic elements in narrative design. Regardless of what type of story you are crafting. The types of novels I tend to write often contain a realistic thread, based on a true crime case, some historical information, and facts regarding it. So how do I weave history, nonfiction, and true crime, into a genre novel? The following are some of my considerations.

Picking the case

The first thing I do is think about what type of crime will complement the genres I am currently writing.

For example, in Forgotten Sisters, there are two crimes that have been committed that are written about. The first is the corporate mishandling of the structure and safety features of the S.S. Eastland which led to the ship capsizing in the Chicago River, resulting in the deaths of 844 citizens in 1915.  The second true crime case explored in that novel is that of a number of unsolved drowning deaths of young men along Chicago area water ways over the past two decades.

Generally, I have an idea of what crime I’m going to cover in my novel given that I often cover the Chicagoland area in my writing and through that, I’m very often reading nonfiction books, or following local news so that I am aware of what is happening in my community.

Using themes to complement the story

My novels tend to have multiple themes running through them. For example, one of the themes in Vanishing Daughters is how acts of violence when ignored only escalate and repeat, leaving communities and people trapped in a pattern of repeating hurt and harm. 

The true crime case I covered there is the unsolved murders of over 51 women throughout the South Side of Chicago, many of which are women of color. The cause of their deaths are largely similar, and so, community members, friends and families of the victims have expressed outrage as to the lack of attention of law enforcement taking steps to investigate these murders as the work of a serial killer.

Click to continue.

Getting lost in research

The research is one of the most important steps. I enjoy the research aspect and can get lost in the research. My aim with this step is to obtain as much information as possible. Not all of it will make it into the novel. However, knowing as much as I possibly can about the crime I’m highlighting will greatly inform the essence of the work. 

For research, I take a multi-step approach. I turn to local news channels, many of which have an accompanying article about the crime committed. Many local news channels also have video segments that can be accessed on their website or on their station site on YouTube. I also subscribe to a number of newspapers. Additionally, I subscribe to some newspaper’s archives, so I can go back, decades and decades, to access material. I live in Chicago and also have access to great research libraries and utilize their services. 

Finally, people are great points of research, from librarians who can direct me to where I need to search, to individuals who can provide primary interviews. I have spoken to people in law enforcement, scientists, funeral home workers, to victims of violent crimes, and more for research purposes for my novels.

Weaving everything together

Now, this is where it becomes tricky, incorporating the research. We cannot have blocks of information within the text. Well, you can do whatever you want in theory, but I would recommend dispensing the true crime/nonfiction/historic details via a variety of narrative approaches so as not to overwhelm the reader with background information.

For example, while in conversation, characters can detail some of this information. True crime details can be provided to the reader via a character’s thoughts, say if they are already familiar with the case. Or, the reader can learn these true crime/nonfiction/historic details along with the character while the character discovers it either through research or another person in the story.

There are some structural approaches you can incorporate as well, such as including news articles, blog posts, transcripts, letters, official records that provide the reader with this detail, and more. Overall, I would recommend any true crime detail or nonfiction information not be presented in a way that slows down the narrative. I have been guilty of slowing down the pacing with sharing too much background information and I am getting better at weaving that in.

Ultimately, the research has to serve your story. What is the point that this nonfiction, historical, or true crime information is trying to make related to your character and theme? What will your character do with this knowledge? How is it applicable to their mission and their growth as a character? You are still writing a story and stories are about how an individual is changed from the beginning of the novel to the end. 

So, however you are incorporating this information it has to be related to your character, to your theme, and to your plot. Nonfiction, historical, and true crime information should be well-researched because having that realistic thread within a fictional tale does provide a great emotional weight. Finally, it needs to be presented smoothly within the text so as not to slow down the pace.

Check out Cynthia Pelayo’s Vanishing Daughters here:

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(Researching Your Fiction Like a Reporter.)

In contemporary screenplays I’ve written, I’ve had to dig into what’s being used for both military and street weaponry, the cop jargon of the moment, advances in science and space travel, the music currently popular with America’s youth—each project reveals something you don’t know enough about. But for my truly ‘historical’ novels- A Moment in the Sun, Jamie MacGillivray, and now To Save the Man, this is a much bigger, and in many ways, more rewarding job. One thing leads to another, you realize you’ve misunderstood history you thought you knew, you get new ideas that can lead you off into undiscovered territory—

Which is very seductive.

And time-consuming. I’ve spent most of the day in a library reading a whole book I was only probing for one factoid. So my basic rule is that I can spend a maximum of one week digging for information for any chapter or sequence, and then I have to sit down and write some fiction. Of course, sometimes you have to leave blanks for details you haven’t nailed down yet, but those can be found and inserted later. Sometimes you’ll write stuff that you later learn makes no historical sense, but I think it’s more important to keep your forward motion going—I’ve even written ‘Better writing here’ in the margins when I’m on a roll and want to get something down before I forget any of it. 

You write, basically, so you have something to rewrite, and I’m lucky in that I very quickly forget what I’ve already done. Two days away, or even better, a week of research on an unrelated topic, and I barely recognize what I’ve already laid down when I get back to it. Because I’m bad at labelling and keeping track of computer files, I have more than once gotten two paragraphs into a scene before starting to wonder, ‘Isn’t this awfully familiar?,’ then discovered an eight-page scene I’d already written a month earlier squirreled away somewhere. Sometimes it’s even good.

To Save the Man began with research I did for a rewrite-for-hire screenplay job I got many years ago, about a once-famous football game between Army and the Carlisle Indian School the last year Jim Thorpe played for them. The script I was given to rework had lots of obvious historical errors just in the football itself—nobody ‘blitzed’ in that era because there were few forward passes, and the word didn’t get into our vocabulary for another 20 years when Hitler started his ‘blitzkreig.’ There wasn’t yet an end zone, goalposts being up at the zero yard line, and coaches weren’t allowed to send plays in with replacements—the quarterbacks were truly ‘field marshals.’ 

So I started from scratch, learning what I could about the origins and ambience of the Carlisle School, and lots of dramatic non-football stories kept popping up. The Thorpe movie never got made, but a character I invented who ran away from the school showed up in my A Moment in the Sun a bit later, and then I wrote a spec screenplay, set in 1890-91 (only shortly after Jim Thorpe was born) and we went about trying to get financing to make it into a movie.

Unsuccessfully.

Something like 20 years passed, and as was the case with Jamie MacGillivray, one day I decided it was too good a story to just abandon, and began to turn it into a novel. For me, the biggest difference in these two forms is their relation to time. I still write feature films to be viewed in one sitting, with editing and music to give the audience a certain rhythmic experience. But anybody who reads A Moment in the Sun, described in one review as ‘a cat-crusher of a book,’ in one sitting, needs an intervention. Most readers pick substantial books up and put them down, sometimes for more than one day, before finishing, so your efforts at rhythmic novel writing go into sequences or chapters.

And then you turn the page.

In adapting a screenplay into a novel the idea of something that will run between 95 and 130 minutes goes out the window, and suddenly the opportunity to inhabit the points of view of multiple characters becomes an option. In movies, generally, there are maybe three distinct points of view—the omniscient (the wide shot of the about-to-be-besieged house on a dark and stormy night), that of the antagonist (seeing the house through the slit in Jason’s hockey mask), and that of the protagonist (the heroine in the closet, watching the chainsaw blade cut through the door). In fiction—take something like Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying—you can create a mosaic of characters and their points of view, which I find a really satisfying way to tell a complex story.

And with each character and situation, questions come up, both about practical details (What year did we start having Social Security numbers?) and larger issues that affect the character’s world view (Is this before the women’s movement? Before Freud? Before capitalism?).

In the case of To Save the Man this meant reading books written by both faculty and students at the school, reading about the histories of various tribes, reading the Carlisle School publications from the era, looking at photographs, getting insurance maps of Carlisle, Pa. in 1890—one new discovery often leading to another I hadn’t even known existed. My biggest serendipitous coups were discovering the juicy family background of the Carlisle teacher who edited the school’s newspapers, finding the pro-genocide newspaper articles of L. Frank Baum of Wizard of Oz fame, and stumbling upon the diaries of Father Francis Craft, a loose-cannon of a Catholic priest who proselytized on the Lakota reservations and was stabbed, not fatally, at the Wounded Knee massacre. A chapter heading from the person who found and assembled his diaries reads ‘Was Father Craft Insane?’

This is a man you’ve got to get into the book—

Check out John Sayles’ To Save the Man here:

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(How to Turn Artifacts and Research Into a Family Memoir.)

A thermos, a Giants hat, a pocketknife, an old wallet, a clipboard, his sports jacket, and a small little bible sitting next to his rings. It didn’t look like much, but these heirlooms were a part of his daily life and these objects could help me tell his story.

Interestingly, when I looked at the heirlooms I could see a sequential timeline. He had bought a new wallet before he died, so I had found his old one, a gift I made for him at an arts and crafts class in elementary school. The pocketknife in the cupholder reminded me of one he had given me in middle school, his Giants hat was torn and smashed but held memories of my dad attending a few of my track meets in high school and wearing a similar hat. The thermos represented his love of coffee that followed a lifetime of drinking booze.

After I wrote about collecting the keepsakes from his car, I let the heirlooms guide me through my writing journey and started with the wallet and pocketknife. The more I thought about my father using these keepsakes and the memories that resonated off them, the more questions I had about his life.

I regrettably never asked enough questions when he was alive. I knew very little about his family tree and upbringing. I knew he was estranged from his father, and his mother was not a stable figure in his life, and he was not close to his other family members.

My dad spent the last years of his life recovering from a life of instability and alcohol addiction and had experienced homelessness. After I graduated high school in the Syracuse area, I moved to Manhattan, and we saw each other maybe twice a year. We had a ‘phone relationship,’ that is when he had a phone. I had some letters and cards he sent me that shared a different address to write him back each time. We didn’t have special memories besides our short visits that took place usually at the bus station.

I had to sleuth to find answers to supplement my memories.

DWI Records

The first artifact I gathered was his DWI records.

After he died and before I started writing, I had an impulse to gather his DWI records from the county where I grew up. After I started writing, I understood why my mind went directly to the records, they were a way to understand the mistakes he carried with him throughout his life. These memories are in the Pocketknife chapter that’s based on seeing a pocketknife in my father’s car and how the pocketknife looked similar to the one he gave me in middle school, right before he was arrested and went to prison because of his drinking problems.

As his life spirals downward, the heart of the chapter is healing our relationship, when I wanted to walk away. I enjoyed incorporating my searching for artifacts into the story.

“…two and half months after my father died, I sent my payment to the Onondaga County Clerk, with a copy of his death certificate and a letter, asking for any information that was on file under my father’s name. When I read the convictions in these files, my shoulders sink and my heart opens more with what has been left unsaid. I’m making peace while staring at these documents that hold the reasons why I hadn’t always wanted him in my life.”

The DWI records also helped my writing process for the Wallet chapter, which held my best memories of us running on a dirt track near my childhood home the summer before I turned 10. Running together would become a core memory of us in the story, the glue of our relationship. I wrote about my father timing me and sharing racing techniques and the togetherness that would soon end because of his alcoholism. This is where the dates from the DWI records helped me see that my father was falling apart during the time I admired him most.

Health Records

I did not know my father’s health records would be so important to my writing process.

I had stalled on gathering this significant artifact from the clinic. It would turn out to be a goldmine for storytelling. It shared over 100 pages of insight on my dad’s health, mental wellbeing, and his depression, the pages are full of sessions with counselors about his livelihood and his rehab plans. The pages share his time in foster care, his academic path, where he lived and when. I could compare these dates with my own path.

I could weave these facets into the story in my own words and share my adult perspective while braiding the narrative with emotions of my younger self. Mostly, reading the records that span 20 years of his life helped me have empathy for my father as a person despite his obvious flaws.

Reading about the darker days of his life made me wonder: Where did he experience joy? Who was he before he drank so much?

I wanted to include facets of my dad’s younger self, to entwine my adolescence with his in the story.

High School Transcripts

Since his health records confirmed he was a foster child in high school, I looked at his yearbook I gathered after he died from one of his old roommates. Then I reached out to the high school’s records department by email.

My father’s high school’s transcripts revealed his home address and the last name of the family he lived with. A girl in his grade in the yearbook had the same last name. In the Internet age, it wasn’t hard to find her. She was happy to talk with me about my dad. Our conversation was a gift and helped me fill in the gaps to the questions I had and helped me envision where my father had spent happier days in his life. The yearbook showed photos of him on the track team in high school and later I connected with one of his track buddies through email to ask questions about his time as a runner.

When I found a pocket-sized New Testament in my dad’s car, I was surprised. I had only heard him swear about life being hell. In this chapter I try to see my father in a new light. In a box stored away and rediscovered after a move, there were letters my father wrote while doing time in a correctional facility. The letters were over 20 years old. I used the letters within the story, transcribing parts of each one. In one of the letters, he had expressed conversations he had with a Reverend and wrote about reclaiming his life. These letters would help me write the chapter about how my dad’s faith had been restored and his hope that he too could be forgiven.

“I’ll have only 43 days left here after you receive this card. One month and one week; so not forever but it feels like eternity. I’ll have been sober for almost 9 months when I get out and want to do something important with the rest of my life.”

During our last visit, he appeared to be happier than I had ever seen him, just three months before the fire. He gave me some of his writings that day from a small journal. His thoughts on these pages would later be part of the Clipboard chapter.

When I wrote about his rings, I remembered a conversation with my father about the night he lost his rings at the homeless shelter, but I wanted further proof of his time there. I turned to the health records, and I emailed the shelter to gain some information about his stay.

“…while looking at his health records, the counselor notes show he was evicted from a home he was living…I’d see the three days he spent at the Rescue Mission following an eviction. It reads that he was planning to apply for public assistance. In capital letters it reads he is homeless and unemployed.”

Piecing Together Clues

When I was writing about the challenges my dad went through, every little email, document, and transcript was like a clue. Every discovery while writing about my father’s troubles was like having a conversation with him, as though he was alive.

In the Giants hat chapter, I reminisce about my own high school track accomplishments by using my binders full of racing stats that coincide with my father’s health records, so I could compare what I was achieving when my father was on probation and failing to get a grip on his life.

To gain a fuller understanding of my father’s young adult life, I needed more information: his military records, his college transcripts, and a copy of his diploma, then I found articles he wrote for a college newspaper that were archived online.

All of these documents improved the story I wanted to tell about our special connection and finding healing after sudden loss. Every artifact helped my grief tremendously along the way too.

After the memoir was published in 2023, I kept searching for more artifacts. When I gathered a copy of my father’s birth certificate it was added to a memory box I can share with my kids. Other keepsakes will wait and will be shared when they are older.

The pages of my story are filled with sorrow, grief, and hardship. I know my father was an imperfect person, but I don’t see him that way; the artifacts showed me who he was beyond his struggles and mistakes.

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(Common Journalism Terms for Writers.)

Journalists have been exposing society’s ills through covert methods for almost two centuries and the term ‘going undercover’ is, of course, universally known. But what does the work really entail?

When undercover, a journalist conceals their identity and purpose while secretly gathering information, often recording either audio or footage with a hidden camera. This can involve infiltrating a group, getting a job where discrimination is suspected, or even something as risky as becoming institutionalized. The purpose is to uncover evidence impossible to acquire through regular reporting methods. It usually involves allegations of corruption, unethical practices, criminal activity, or abuse.

In its Code of Ethics, the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) advises us to, “avoid undercover or other surreptitious methods of gathering information unless traditional, open methods will not yield information vital to the public.”

This is great advice on a subject dear to my heart, as my most memorable (and potentially dangerous) assignments involved undercover work. Infiltrating an alleged cult in Cardiff, Wales, and spending five weeks secretly filming, was both exhilarating and exhausting. This was my biggest undercover role, and it affected my personal life in many ways, which I’ll discuss shortly. For another story, I posed as a chinchilla breeder while investigating illegal fur farming. I spent several nights ‘spying’ on a group of unruly youths and recording their noise from an elderly lady’s bedroom window. And being ‘conservative with the truth’ was necessary when asking permission to film at a greyhound racetrack for a piece exposing the cruel treatment of retired racing dogs.

The moral dilemma for me—which mirrors some of the concerns expressed by many in the industry—was having to make up a story to conceal my identity. In simple terms, I had to lie. A lot. Pretending to be someone else when you’re acting in a play is one thing, but deceiving people in real life? It’s dangerous and emotionally draining, especially when long term and when there are innocent people involved, who you cannot help without blowing your cover. But the end justifies the means. In my case infiltrating and exposing the (allegedly) second most dangerous cult in the UK, accused of ruining many lives, was reason enough.

Breach of trust is one of the issues that emerges with undercover journalism and why some professionals are concerned. When you must lie in order to reveal the truth, do you lose credibility and the public’s trust? Does the outlet gain a reputation for deceit? I would argue that it depends on the story and most people are savvy enough to understand the reasons for a journalist’s exposé.

Undercover journalists have been exposing society’s ills for a long time, telling important stories that would have otherwise remained hidden. In 1887, journalist Elizabeth Cochrane (Nellie Bly) spent 10 days undercover as a patient in a New York sanatorium. Her six-part series, “Ten Days in a Mad-House,” was published in The New York World, and exposed terrible conditions and abuse, leading to improvements in the treatment of those with a mental illness. And in 1935, journalist Marvel Cooke and activist Ella Baker went undercover to expose the working conditions of Black women domestic workers in the Bronx, and their piece, “The Bronx Slave Market,” was published by The Crisis in November 1935.

But the journalism field has dramatically changed, and the media landscape is now vastly different.

Undercover work is not easy, it’s not cheap, and it can have serious repercussions. My assignments were only possible because we had a team of experienced professionals, a healthy budget, the luxury of time, the tools, and… lawyers. To successfully pull off these types of investigations today you need money, bottom line. Money buys you the staff that can spend weeks, months, or even years on a story. It buys you expertise, training, and equipment. And because there could be legal actions, it pays the lawyers’ fees—before and after getting sued. And our program did get sued. This also occurred in the mid to late 90s, which was a completely different era in journalism.

“This is expensive work, it ties up staff for months on end, it’s stressful, and it requires all kinds of legal vetting,” says New York University professor, Brooke Kroeger, author of Undercover Reporting: The Truth About Deception. She adds that journalists should “think really hard” before undertaking this type of work, while emphasizing that, “historically, the impact of these stories, when they worked, was just extraordinary. And they are the stories we remember.”

Today, traditional news outlets still employ investigative teams, but budgets have been severely cut and undercover work is not as prevalent. According to the Associated Press, the country has lost one-third of its newspapers and two-thirds of its newspaper journalists since 2005. This amounts to more than 3,000 closures, especially affecting local newspapers in rural areas, causing some regions to become news deserts. With fewer journalists, cutbacks, and closures, it’s little wonder that undercover journalism is in decline.

In addition to budgetary issues, there are legal repercussions. The famous Food Lion case explains some of the media’s reluctance to pursue undercover journalism. In 1992, ABC journalists working for “Prime Time Live” went undercover as Food Lion employees and secretly filmed, exposing possible unsanitary practices. Food Lion sued ABC in federal court in Greensboro, NC, alleging fraud, breach of the duty of loyalty, trespass, and unfair trade practices under North Carolina law. Food Lion claimed ABC used illegal news-gathering methods to obtain the information.

The focus here therefore was not defamation, but the methods used. This is a landmark legal battle addressing whether journalists can be protected by the First Amendment when they lie to gain access to private facilities for the purpose of news-gathering. (More information on this case, the appeals, and the 2023 challenge to the ag-gag law by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) can be found in the Resources section below.)

The group I infiltrated and secretly filmed tried suing me and the TV show for invasion of privacy, but luckily, the station lawyers dealt with it.

But what about personal consequences? As I mentioned earlier, going undercover can be stressful and risky. I joined the alleged cult ‘cold’ with no knowledge of the group and having never watched interviews with former members accusing them of brainwashing and manipulation. This way I started my investigation with a clean slate and no preconceived ideas. But this also left me vulnerable to their tactics, which do wear you down, even when you’re ‘in the know.’

When developing a cover story, we stuck to the truth as much as possible, to prevent slip ups. This meant using my real name, address, and phone number, and telling them I’d just moved back from the US with my American husband and was unemployed. Unfortunately, work and home life often intertwined. A prominent member started calling my husband to persuade him to join the church. When the show was broadcast one of his colleagues confronted him, saying, ‘Your wife did that hit piece on my church.’ 

It turned out one of his smoke break buddies was a member. We ended up moving to a different apartment and changing our phone number a few weeks later. I did suffer from nightmares for about a month, but there were no lasting effects. Overall, it was an interesting and challenging time. Would I do it again? I doubt it.

While this is not work for lone freelancers to even contemplate, many independent outlets and documentarians have, and still do, engage in undercover work, with varying degrees of success. Groups like Project Veritas became well known for their undercover stings but were largely criticized by the mainstream press for being sensational, and they have since suspended operations.

Many argued that undercover journalism became overused as ‘stunt journalism’ with one Guardian columnist back in 2007 describing it as “entertainment puffed up with a fake significance,” and a “journalistic addiction, a habit we need to kick.”

Undercover work can appear exciting and appealing. But it’s unacceptable and can ruin lives when used in isolation, for example one short clip on TikTok with no reference material and no interviews with the ‘accused’ or the other side.

But when done correctly, and is part of a wider, well-researched investigation and included in a report alongside supporting material conducted through traditional journalistic methods, it’s a powerful and potent tool for good.

But just like they say on TV shows, please don’t try this at home.

Resources:

• https://gijn.org/resource/gijns-guide-to-undercover-reporting/
• https://www.cjr.org/campaign_desk/the_ethics_of_undercover_journalism.php
• https://www.npr.org/2020/08/03/898547327/ghosting-the-news-author-says-local-journalism-freefall-is-accelerating
• https://freedom.press/issues/is-it-time-to-revisit-undercover-journalism/
• https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/women-reporters-undercover-most-important-scoops-day-180960775/
• https://knightcolumbia.org/blog/the-long-shadow-of-food-lion
• https://www.rcfp.org/journals/news-media-and-law-spring-2012/landmark-food-lion-case/
• https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/the-supreme-court-leaves-in-place-a-court-victory-for-peta-over-north-carolinas-undercover-gag-law
• https://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2007/jan/21/goingundercoverisajournali
• https://www.nyu.edu/about/news-publications/news/2012/august/nyu-launches-history-of-undercover-reporting-database.html
• https://www.nyhistory.org/blogs/how-journalists-ella-baker-and-marvel-jackson-cooke-exposed-domestic-works-slave-market

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(Things Writers Should Know)

A character instantly dropping dead from an insulin overdose sounds dramatic, but it’s also very wrong. And many readers today are savvier about drugs than ever before. They may be recovering from addiction, struggling with diabetes, or a healthcare worker. Or they may have been personally impacted by the growing fentanyl overdose epidemic. 

For these readers, a blatantly inaccurate drug-related scene can ruin an otherwise great story, leading to negative reviews. It also robs them of an emotional-roller coaster while the character struggles, as the drug slowly begins to create trouble.

So, how can you avoid these pitfalls? By simply using the power of real drug facts. These facts not only offer authentic scenes, but enough peril to draw readers from page to page. Prefer a light-hearted scene? A few real facts can have your readers laughing, as they watch a mom hallucinating in the fruit aisle of the grocery store, after taking far too much cough syrup. Real drug facts can also help writers develop characters with complex backstories: the parent whose teen overdosed on left-over pain pills or the recovering heroin addict.

Thankfully, writers don’t need in-depth drug knowledge to successfully develop these realistic scenes. Following these simple, but key, tips will help assure accuracy:

1. Check the Historical Timeline

While it may seem obvious, it’s important to check that the drug or medical device used in your plot had been discovered by the historical time period of your story. Paying attention to details, such as which kind of drugs were available and in what form (pills, injection, etc.) is important. 

A 1630s pilgrim shouldn’t be using a modern-day drug patch for his pain. Instead, swapping that patch for a mustard poultice would suit the historical context. Likewise, a midwife shouldn’t give a shot to ease the labor pain of that pilgrim’s wife. A tea infused with herbal pain remedies would be more realistic. 

This doesn’t mean an historical story can’t lend itself to peril for your character. That mustard plaster may sound boring, but, as a writer, you can take your readers through the emotions of hope, as the healer applies it to the moaning townsman, relief as the man begins to rest, and finally plunging into worry, as the bandages are pulled back to reveal angry, blistering skin from a plaster left on too long. And what about that midwife? She’s young and inexperienced. What if she mixes too strong of a tea, sending the laboring mom into an overdose, even as the baby is born. Now what?

Historical accuracy is also impacted by a number of other variables, including changes in prescribing trends, as new treatments are discovered. These trends impact the products diverted to street drug supplies or available in home medicine cabinets. In addition, drug abuse trends are impacted by the influx of illegal drugs across borders. The recent upsurge of overdose deaths from fentanyl-laced counterfeit pills, such as oxycodone, is a prime example. A scene set in the mid-1990s could realistically involve stolen oxycodone from a medicine cabinet, whereas in a modern scene that oxycodone is more likely illicit and laced with deadly fentanyl. These sad realities readily lend themselves to believable trouble for your character.

2. Learn the Language

Many of us are familiar with the drug-related terminology we heard from friends or in movies while growing up: terms like weed or bong or phrases like chasing the dragon. But like all colloquial phrases, the slang associated with illicit and recreational drug use has greatly changed over the decades. 

For example, getting stoned has morphed into being baked or faded. Having a contemporary character ask a friend for a doobie would be outdated, while asking for a blunt or vape would be more modern. 

Even the language associated with obtaining drugs has evolved. Instead of a whispered exchange on a street corner, your contemporary character could simply send coded emojis via a social media app to order illicit drugs and schedule their delivery. When your character gets a text of a school bus and a chocolate bar, he’ll understand his ecstasy will be delivered to him at the school playground.

3. Verify the Legal Accuracy

Drug-related laws are rapidly changing, offering a wide array of creative scene options. Laws can vary from state to state and even between individual states and the federal level, creating confusion for people, not to mention the risk of potentially inaccurate stories for writers. 

For example, recent changes in some states have led to the legalization of hallucinogenic mushrooms. These mushrooms are under tight control, however, so your character shouldn’t just walk into a drug store to buy them off of the shelves (well, not yet, anyway). In most other states, hallucinogenic mushrooms remain illegal. 

If you want to have some legal fun, your character can buy a large supply of hallucinogenic mushrooms while on vacation, only to be arrested when she flies to her home state, where they are illegal. It’s much like the trouble Brittany Griner found herself in, when cannabis vape cartridges were confiscated from her luggage in Russia, sending her to prison and creating an international drama.

4. Rewrite Instant Death Scenes

This is a Hollywood favorite: A drug is swallowed, followed by the character instantly dropping to the ground in a seizure, foam dripping from his mouth. And while the foam part may be accurate, the instant effect is not. Nor is having his distraught co-character immediately announce his death. Yes, it’s visually entertaining. And completely wrong.

Most of your readers know it takes a bit of time for drugs to work. After all, most of us have suffered headaches, while waiting for a pain pill to work. At the very least, a drug first must be absorbed. Then, it takes a little time for an effect, good or bad. Why risk alienating audiences, when you can take advantage of this knowledge, allowing your screenplay to take readers on a rewarding journey, tensing as their favorite character begins to slur, then stumble, then… fade to black?

Now, that’s a page-turner.

5. Choose the Right Symptoms

Giving your character the wrong drug symptoms (or making up your own) can hurt your credibility. A melatonin overdose won’t cause an adult character to stop breathing. A few extra vitamin capsules won’t cause hallucinations. But there are plenty of interesting real symptoms that will fit your plot, provided you choose the right drug.

If you really want those vitamins to cause hallucinations, instead of creating fake symptoms, a pill mix-up can be your answer. If you’ve sprinkled the bread crumbs well, your character, who stores bottles of vitamins and hallucinogenic mushroom capsules next to each other, can end up in an adventure she wasn’t planning. 

As she makes her coffee, blurry-eyed, and grabs the wrong bottle—downing a few mushroom capsules instead of her vitamins—your readers will be anticipating what will happen during her upcoming morning interview.

6. Verify Overdose Potential

A drug overdose can be woven into your story. With some drugs, your character can even be brought back from the brink of death. Opioids, such as fentanyl, can shut down the ability to breathe, leading to rapid death. The antidote naloxone, if given in time, can undo that breathing effect, allowing your character to survive. 

Some drugs, though, have little or no ability to cause an overdose death. A desperately depressed character that swallows too many melatonin tablets is likely to get very drowsy, but it’s not realistic to open the next scene with the family weeping by her coffin. Melatonin overdoses in children, however, is another story entirely. 

If your character’s child mistakes Mom’s melatonin gummies for candy, the next scene could believably open with the family holding hands bedside, the child on a ventilator in the hospital, the doctor looking somber.

7. Use Reliable Resources

Online resources have made researching drug effects simpler over the decades, although not all information is factual. From newspaper articles to websites, wrong drug information abounds. 

For example, gross inaccuracies were perpetuated online regarding the risk of death from merely touching fentanyl pills. The increased use of artificial intelligence for information searches can amplify this kind of inaccurate information. However, there are numerous reputable drug information sources. 

Drug Package Inserts (also called Prescribing Information) reliably offer insight into possible symptoms and can be searched online by the drug name. Poison Control Centers and the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) are great resources for overdose trends. And the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) periodically posts comprehensive updates that detail illicit drug abuse and trafficking trends.

As writers, we’re accustomed to researching pertinent facts and information. Accurately portraying real drug facts should be no different. Applying these seven key tips can help you avoid blatantly unrealistic scenes, while offering a better reader journey. But synthesizing these ideas into authentic scenarios can be a little more difficult. 

Once your scene is complete, consider including beta readers with backgrounds in drug-related fields, such as pharmacy, emergency medicine, addiction, or even forensics, as a valuable step to validate your interpretation, assuring your readers will love every page. 

The post 7 Key Tips for Writing Realistically Perilous Drug Scenes appeared first on Writer's Digest.